2025 PGA Championship weekend betting tips: My top picks for Quail Hollow’s deciding days
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Resident tipster Tom Jacobs offers his top PGA Championship weekend betting tips as the season’s second major heads into Moving Day.
It’s business time at Quail Hollow as 156 becomes 74, with just 36 holes left to decide the destiny of the 2025 Wanamaker Trophy.
With prices now live for the final two days of action, here’s who I’m backing…
PGA Championship weekend betting tips
The opening round of the PGA Championship caught everyone by surprise as a lot of the big names struggled, while Jhonattan Vegas led, finishing the day two ahead of Ryan Gerard and Cam Davis. Both Ryder Cup captains, Luke Donald and Keegan Bradley also cracked the top 10 of the leaderboard on day one, with the former particularly surprising.
Round two saw some of the bigger names make their way to the top of the leaderboard, with World No.1 and pre-tournament favourite Scottie Scheffler now lurking three shots behind 36-hole leader Vegas. 2022 US Open winner Matt Fitzpatrick has found form to sit T2 going into the weekend, while course winner and Presidents Cup hero Max Homa sits at -5 alongside Scheffler.
What about Rory McIlroy?
Rory McIlroy was hoping to make it two major wins in a row, after completing the much-coveted Grand Slam at Augusta, but it’s not gone to plan so far for the World No.2.
McIlroy did make the cut, but both he and playing partner Xander Schauffele had to work for it. Rory finds himself nine strokes back of Vegas’ 36-hole lead.
While he is nine behind Vegas and seven behind the trio in T2, Rory will have his sights set on Scheffler, who is six ahead right now. If he can make up ground on his rival, he can get back in the hunt, at a course he’s already won four times at before.
McIlroy has made up huge deficits in the past, overcoming a six-shot deficit at the halfway point at Pebble earlier this year, and a 10-shot deficit after 36 holes in Dubai last year. Oh, and there’s this:
These are not isolated incidents, he’s done it multiple times in regular events, but in the majors he’s either led or been within two shots of the lead at this stage – he might just have left himself too much to do here, as he gives up six strokes to Scheffler and a further stroke to Ryder Cup teammate, Fitzpatrick – even if we overlook Vegas for now.
PGA Championship Betting Tips at the Halfway Stage
Now that we have 36 holes of data to go by and have a sense of how the course is going to play, I have made a couple of placement bets and looked at the 2-ball markets as well. Here are my bets for the weekend.
Matt Fitzpatrick to Finish Inside the Top 10 (11/10 BetMGM, Unibet)
Listen, I know this won’t get anyone off their seats, but for a recent major champion to be sitting T2 after 36 holes, and still be odds-against to finish inside the top 10, I think a bet on Matt Fitzpatrick in this market is worthwhile.
25 times in his career, Fitzpatrick has either led or been within two shots of the lead after 36 holes, and on 20 of those occasions, he has ended up finishing inside the top 10. He has never finished worse than 20th from this point, and if he has dropped outside the top 10 he’s generally hovered around the number, from 11th to 14th, barring that one time he did indeed drop to 20th, back in 2015 when he was just getting started.
If we change the parameters slightly and just look at all the occasions he’s been inside the top two going into the weekend, he’s only finished outside the top 10 once. He finished 12th at the 2017 DP World Tour Championship, but was the 36-hole leader and had a lot of pressure on him. At this stage, the pressure is on Vegas, who has a huge target on his back.
To say I am surprised that Fitzpatrick is in this position is an understatement, as his form has dropped off dramatically over the past year, but there were limited signs in recent weeks that he was working his way back, and he seems confident he can keep it going now, and the data backs it up.
Fitzpatrick gained strokes on approach in his last two solo starts on the PGA Tour, and he’s done so again in each of the first two rounds here. It seems like he’s found enough in his game to contend here.
Ranking 6th in SG Tee to Green, Fitzpatrick’s all-around game is in great shape this week, and that’s all we needed to see from a player as talented as he is.
The odds suggest he only has a 48% chance of staying inside the top 10 this weekend, but the data suggests he finishes inside 95% of the time if he sits T2 or better at halfway. So yes, this is a short bet, and Fitzpatrick has been fragile in recent months, but history suggests that now he’s in the mix, he will stay there, and the odds look generous.
Daniel Berger to Finish Inside the Top 20 (3/1 Betfred)
Daniel Berger has been in brilliant form since last October, and will be looking to make a charge to record a 7th top 20 of the season, and his third in a row. Since finishing T21 at The Masters, Berger has finished T3 at The Heritage and T11 at the Truist Championship, and he’ll now want to make an impression in a second-straight major.
So why do I think he can post another top 20 this weekend, despite sitting in T48 right now? Well first of all, he’s only three shots adrift, and that can be made up very quickly on moving day. Secondly, his ball striking has been electric, as he ranks 3rd in SG Approach and 29th in SG Off the Tee, good enough to rank 5th in SG Tee to Green thru two rounds.
It will come as no surprise to learn then that it is the putter that is holding Berger back, but given this club has been kind to him for most of the season, I am willing to bet he turns things around over the weekend with the flat stick.
A player in form, who can boast a top 12 finish in each of the four majors, I am confident Berger can find those good feelings again this weekend. Someone always makes an early charge on moving day of a major, and Berger is a prime candidate this weekend, given his ball striking form.
I will back Berger to climb the leaderboard, rather than bank on a couple of players already in the top 20 holding on, with Ryan Fox and Garrick Higgo shortlisted to do just that.
PGA Championship Round Three Two-Ball Tips
Here are my two-ball tips for the 3rd round of the PGA Championship.
Ryan Fox to Beat Alex Smalley in Round 3 (11/10 Betfred)
Ryan Fox is more experienced in major championships than Alex Smalley is, and while both of them posted career-best finishes of T23 in this major back in 2023, I want to take the proven major player, who came into this event off the back of his first PGA Tour win.
There’s still two majors Smalley hasn’t played (Masters and Open Championship) and outside of the T23 in this event in 2023, Smalley has missed the cut in his other two major starts.
Neither player is particularly flushing it with their irons, but Fox is ahead of him in SG Approach thru the first two rounds, as he ranks 43rd in that category while Smalley ranks 69th.
The approach play isn’t the only metric we should look at, Smalley also ranks 8th in SG Putting through the first two rounds, and that is what is driving his score alongside his play off the tee. Around the Greens and on Approach he is struggling, and that is why I will give Fox a chance in this head-to-head at odds-against.
With four DP World Tour wins, and now a PGA Tour win under his belt, Fox has all the credentials to be a major contender, and it will be interesting to see if he can make that jump this weekend as he sits in a tie for 7th and just four strokes back of Vegas.
Momentum is a big thing in golf, and while Smalley bogeyed the 12th, 17th and 18th holes to close out his round, suggesting the pressure of being near the top of the leaderboard was starting to tell, Fox birdied holes 15 and 18 to finish in a positive manner. He was just 1 of 11 players to birdie the 18th on Friday too, another small positive.
J.J. Spaun to Beat Aaron Rai in Round 3 (11/10 Betfred)
J.J Spaun and Aaron Rai are very similar players. Both have won once on the PGA Tour, and both are enjoying good spells in their career. Now they find themselves paired together on moving day in a major, and I think Spaun is better equipped to cope with this position over the weekend.
Spaun ranks 1st in SG Approach, 18th in SG Off the Tee and 4th overall in SG Tee to Green so far this week, and despite a horrible short game, still sits at -3. Given Spaun is generally a decent enough putter, and statistically he’s better than Rai in that department this season, I trust him to find a better stroke over the weekend.
Rai, on the other hand, is struggling off the tee, ranking 99th in the field so far this week in SG Off the Tee. When players look to separate themselves this weekend, the driver could be the key, and I trust Spaun to find a putting stroke more than I do Rai to suddenly start improving his game off the tee mid-tournament.
Given how close these two players are in quality and confidence, I will take Spaun as the underdog, in the hope his ball striking remains incredibly consistent, and there is a small uptick in his short game.
Enjoy Saturday’s action and I’ll be back with even more tips ahead of Sunday’s final round.
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Expert selected PGA Championship weekend betting tips from Today's Golfer.
